September 15 NHL History
1960: Maurice Richard announces his retirement after 18 seasons in the NHL, all with the Montreal Canadiens. The “Rocket” retires at age 39 after playing on eight Stanley Cup-winning teams and finishes his career as the NHL’s all-time leader with 544 goals, including 50 in 50 games during the 1944-45 season.
1976: Darryl Sittler‘s goal at 11:33 of overtime gives Canada a 5-4 victory against Czechoslovakia and a two-game sweep of the final in the first Canada Cup tournament in Montreal. Czechoslovakia overcomes deficits of 2-0 and 3-2 to take a 4-3 lead, but Bill Barber forces overtime when he scores with 2:12 remaining in the third period. Sittler then delights the crowd at the Forum when he scores to win hockey’s first best-on-best championship tournament.
1987: Canada wins arguably the best hockey series ever played by rallying to defeat the Soviet Union 6-5 at Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario, in Game 3 of the Final to win the Canada Cup.
The game, like the series, sees huge momentum swings. The Soviets lead 3-0 eight minutes into the first period. Canada rallies to take a 5-4 lead, but a goal by Alexander Semak at 12:21 of the third period ties the game 5-5. The third overtime in as many games is less than 90 seconds away when Mario Lemieux scores on a pass from Wayne Gretzky for the win.
Gretzky finishes with tournament highs of 18 assists and 21 points in nine games and is named MVP. Many of his assists come on passes to Lemieux, who leads all scorers with 11 goals, including the winner in Games 2 and 3.
